1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the field of medicine and, in particular, to the field of in vivo drug delivery systems. A preferred thermal pharmaceutical delivery system includes an implantable drug delivery unit including a drug absorbent gel body capable of desorbing a drug upon being heated, a heating element positioned within the gel, and a power receiving antenna coupled with the heating element.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the field of medicine, pharmaceuticals may be delivered into a patient by injection into the blood stream or injection into a particular site. These known delivery techniques are sometimes ineffective or are of reduced effectiveness for some medical conditions such as certain types of cancerous tumors.
For example, some drugs are known to be very effective on specific types of cancer cells. However, delivery by injection into the blood stream may result in objectionable side effects because of the impact of the drugs on healthy tissues. In other cases, effectiveness is reduced because the drugs do not transfer readily between the blood stream and the site of the cancerous tissue.
Direct injection into a particular site may be effective in certain cases and impractical in others. For example, some sites may be inaccessible using injection techniques or may require injections so frequent as to be objectionable.